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A LECTURE 

ORE THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE, NEW YORK, 

OCT. 20, 1853, IN THE BROADAVAY TABERNACLE. 



BY 



# DEC 88 
N. MANCHESTER, 
INDIANA 4696? 


HECKMAN |±J 

BINDERY INC. |§| 



WILLIAM H. SEWAKD, 

ED states' senator, AND EX-GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK. 



NEAY YORK: 
FOWI.ERS AND WELLS, PUBT/ISHEKS, 

CLINTON HALL, 131 NASSAU STREET. 



igton flt. ) 



1853. 



London, 
142 Strand. 



K. Y, Ful) L'b. 

Jilt la i9oj^ 



,S5I 



THE TEUE BASIS 



OF 



AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE 



Fellow-Citizens : I do not know how lightly you, who are 
hurried so fiist through the ever-changing panorama of metropoli- 
tan life, may regard the quiet scenes of this unpretendmg festival, 
appointed and arranged with so much care by the American In- 
stitute ; but I confess for myself, that, coming from a distant and 
rural home, and so being never more than an occasional specta- 
tor here, I find always the same first freshness, in these autumnal 
shows of flowers, and fruits, and animals of subsistence, fleece and 
burden, trained and perfected by hard yet gentle hands ; and these 
annual trials of the skill of enmlous, yet unambitious men and 
women, in the use of the spade and the plow, the forge and the 
furnace, the dairy and the needle, the spindle and the loom, in- 
nocent in their nature, yet beneficent in their efiect, by stimulat- 
ing invention and enterprise, while they faithfully mark, as years 
roll on, the progress which our country is making in arts and 
civilization, never fail to excite within me sympathies and emo- 
tions more profound and pleasing, than any State pageant which 
1 have witnessed at home, or the most imposing demonstration 
of military power that can be seen in any other and less favored 
land. 

Society divides concerning that progress. Those who are oc- 
cupied with their own personal cares, and apprehensive of evil in 
every change, look upon it with indifference or distrust ; others, 



4 THE TRUE BASIS OF 

knowing that in a Republic, constituted as this is, there is always 
a restless activity toward either peace or war, virtue or vice, great- 
ness or shame, devote themselves to the duty of regulating that 
activity, and giving it a right direction. 

The members of the American Institute are of this class. Hav- 
ing constantly sympathized with them heretofore, when their un- 
remitted labors secured neither rewards nor favor, I rejoice in 
meeting them now, under more propitious circumstances. 1 con- 
gratulate you, Messrs. Reese, Livingston and Hall, Stillman, 
Meigs and Chandler, and others, associates, that your institution 
has been adopted as a model b}^ many towns, and by all the 
counties in this State, by the State itself, and by many other 
States ; and that your instructions and example, patiently con- 
tinued through so many years, have at last induced the nation it- 
self to consent to appear, and to win some significant trophies, in 
the Exhibition of Universal Industry, already held in London, and 
to inaugurate another and brilliant one in the world's new capital, 
which we are founding on this yet rude coast of a recently impas- 
sable ocean. 

Nevertheless, I have been for many reasons habitually averse 
from mingling in the sometimes excited debates which crowd 
upon each other in a great city. There was, however, an authority 
which I could not disobey, in the venerable name and almost pa- 
ternal kindness of the eminent citizen, who so recently presided here 
with dignity and serenity all his own ; and who transmitted the 
invitation of the Institute, and persuaded its acceptance ! 

How sudden his death ! Only three w*eeks ago, the morning 
mail brought to me his announcement of his arrival to arrange 
this exhibition, and his summons to me to join him here ; and the 
evening dispatch, on the self same day, bore the painful intelli- 
gence that the lofty genius which had communed with kindred 
spirits so long, on the interests of his country, had departed from 
the earth, and that the majestic form which had been animated by 
it, had disappeared forever from among living men. 

I had disciplined myself when coming here, so as to purpose 
to speak no word for the cause of human freedom, lest what might 
seem too persistent an advocacy might offend. But must I, there 



AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE. 5 

fore, abridge of its just proportions the eulogium which the occa- 
sion and the character of the honored dead alike demand 1 

The first ballot which I cast for the chief niagistracy of 
my native and most beloved State, bore the name of James 
Talhnadge, as the alternate of De Witt Clinton. If I have never 
faltered in pursuing the policy of that immortal statesman, 
through loud reproach and vindictive opposition during his life, 
and amid clamors and contentions, often amounting almost to 
faction, since his death, I have found as little occasion to hesitate 
or waver in adhering to the counsels and example of the illus- 
trious compeer, who, after surviving him so many years, has nov,- 
been removed, in ripened age, to the companionship of the just. 
How does not time vindicate fidelity to Truth and to our country i 
A vote for Clinton and Tallmadge in 1824, what censures did it 
not bring then 1 Who will impeach that ballot now 1 

A statesman's claim to the gratitude of his country rests on 
what were, or what would have been, the results of the policy he 
has recommended. If the counsels of James Tallmadge had 
completely prevailed, then not only would American forests, 
mines, soil, invention, and industry, have rendered our country, 
now and forever, independent of all other nations, except for 
what climate forbids ; but then, also, no menial hand would ever 
have guided a plough, and no footstep of a slave would ever have 
been tracked on the soil of all that vast part of our national do- 
main that stretches away from the banks of the Mississippi to 
the far western ocean. 

This was the policy of James Tallmadge. It was worthy of 
New- York, in whose name it was promulgated. It would have 
been noble, even to have altogether failed in establishing it. He 
was successful, however, in part, though only through unwise de- 
lays and unnecessary conipromises, which he strenuously opposed, 
and which, therefore, have not impaired his just flime. And so 
in the end, he more nearly than any other citizen of our time, 
realized the description of the happiest man in the world, given 
to the frivolous Croesus by the great Athenian : " He saw his 
offspring, and they all survived him. At the close of an honora- 
ble and prosperous life, on the field of civic victory, he was re- 



6 THE TRUE BASIS OF 

warded with the honors of a public funeral, by the State that he 
had enriched, adorned, and enlarged." 

Gentlemen of the American Institute, Dr. Johnson truly said — 
that the first man who balanced a straw on his nose ; the first 
man who rode three horses at a time ; in short, all such men de- 
served the applause of mankind, on account, not of the use of 
what they did, but of the dexterity which they exhibited ; for that 
every thing which enlarged the sphere of human powers, and 
showed man that he could do what he thought he could not do, 
was valuable. I apprehend that this is a true exposition of the 
philosophy of your own most useful labors. 

The increase of personal power and skill diminishes individual 
dependence ; and individual independence, when it pervades the 
whole State, is national independence. It is only when, through 
such individuality of its members, a nation attains a certain in- 
dependence, that it passes from that condition of society in which 
it thinks, moves, and acts, whether for peace or for war, for right 
or for wrong, according to the interests or caprices of one, or of 
a few persons, (a condition which defines monarchy or aristoc- 
racy,) to that better condition in which it thinks, moves, and acts, 
in all things, under the direction of one common interest, ascer- 
tained and determined by the intelligent consent of a majority, or 
all of its members ; which condition constitutes a Republic or 
Democracy. So Democracy, wherever it exists, is more or less 
perfect, and, of course, more or less safe and strong, according 
to the tone of individuality maintained by its citizens. 

Of all men, and of all nations, it seems to me that Americans, 
and this Republic, have at once the least excuse for a want of in- 
dependence, and the most need for assuming and maintaining it. 

No other nation has equal elements of society and of Empire. 
Charlemagne, when founding his kingdom, saw, or might have 
seen, that while it was confined by the ocean and by the' Medi- 
terranean on the west and on the south, it was equally shut in 
northerly and eastwardly by river and mountain barriers, which 
would be successfully maintained forever, by races as vigorous 
and as independent as the Franks themselves. Alfred the Great 
saw so clearly how his country was circumscribed by the seas, 
ihat he never once thought of continental Empire. The future 



AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE. 7 

career of France and England may, like the past, be filled up 
with spasmodic efforts to enlarge fixed dominions by military 
conquests, and agricultural and commercial colonies, but all such 
attempts, even if they should be as gigantic as those which have 
heretofore been made, will, like them, be followed by disastrous 
reactions, bringing the nations back again, and confining them at 
last within their natural and earliest borders. No political sys- 
tem can be held together permanently, by force suspending or 
overpowering the laws of political affinity and gravitation. Un- 
like those nations, we are a homogeneous people, occupying a 
compact and indivisible domain, peculiarly adapted to internal 
commerce, seventeen times greater than that of France, and an 
hundred times more extended than that of Great Britain. While 
it spreads eastward and westward across the Continent, nature 
has not interposed, nor has man erected, nor can he raise, a bar- 
rier on the north or on the south, that can prevent any expansion 
that shall be found necessary, provided only that our efforts to 
effect it shall be, as they ought to be, wise, peaceful, and mag- 
nanimous. Only Russia excels us in territorial greatness. But 
while all of her vast population are not merely willing, but even 
superstitious subjects, of an unmitigated despotism, more than 
four-fifths of them are predial slaves. If such a population could, 
within any short period, rise up to a state of comparative social 
elevation, such a change would immediately lead to seditions that 
must inevitably result in dismemberment of the E,mpire. 

Why should we go abroad for mineral materials, or for metal- 
lic treasures, since this broad domain of ours is even more plenti- 
fully than any equal portion of the earth, stored with Marl, 
Gypsum, Salt, Coal, Quicksilver, Lead, Copper, Iron and Gold ? 
Where shall we find quarries and forests, producing more amply 
the materials for architecture, whether for the purposes of peace, 
or of war on land or on seal Our cities may be built of our 
own free-stone, marble and granite ; and our Southern coasts are 
fringed with pine and live-oak, while timber and lumber, diversi- 
fied and exhaustless, crown our Northern mountains and plains. 

Why should we resort to other soils and climates for supplies 
of subsistence, if we except spices, dyes, and some not indispensa- 
ble tropical fruits, since we have sugar, rice and cotton fields 



8 THE TRUE BASIS OF 

stretching along the shore of the Gulf, long mountain ranges, such 
as those of Virginia and Vermont, declivities in which the vine 
delights, along the banks of the Ohio, and the endless prairies, 
fertile in all cereal grains, tobacco, flax and hemp, that border 
the Lakes and the Mississippi, and their widely-branching and far- 
reaching inlets and tributaries 1 

If there is virtue in blood, what nation traces its lineage to 
purer and gentler stocks 1 And what nation increases in num- 
bers, by either immigration or by native births, more rapidly 1 
And what nation, moreover, has risen in intelligence equally or 
so fast 1 

If it be asked whether we have spirit and vigor proportioned 
to our natural resources, I answer, look at these thirteen original 
States. Their vigor is not only unimpaired, but it is increasing. 
Then, look at the eighteen others, offshoots of those stocks. They 
are even more elastic and thrifty. Consider how small and how 
recently planted were the germs of all this political luxuriance, 
and to wdiat early hardships and neglect they were exposed. 
Can we not reasonably look for a maturity full of strength and 
majesty ? 

Moreover, the circumstances of the age are propitious to us. 
The nations on this continent are new, youthful and fraternal, 
while those existing on the other are either lying in hopeless de-- 
basement, or are preparing to undergo the convulsions of an in- 
dispensable regeneration. What power, then, need we fear ? 
"What power, if we were in danger, could yield us protection, or 
even aid ? 

V^^hile our constitutions and laws establish political equality, 
they operate to produce social equality also, b}^ preventing mo- 
nopolies of land and great accumulation of wealth ; and so they 
afford incentives to universal activity and emulation. Why, then, 
should not the American citizen and the American Republic be 
consciously independent in all things, as in all things they are 
safe and free 1 

Such independence should be attained and preserved, not by a 
few only, but, as far as possible, by all citizens. It is not less 
essential that the farmer, the mechanic, and the laborer shall enjoy 
it, than that it shall regulate the action of the merchant, the law- 



AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE. 9 

yer and the statesman. Every member of the State may become 
a soldier and even a senator. He can never be less than an 
elector. What does not tlie Republic owe to Sherman and 
Franklin? Yet, they were mechanics. What would not have 
been its fate but for the independence of the captors of Andre ? 
Yet, Paulding, Williams and Van Wart were mere laboring men. 

Virtue is confessedly the vital principle of the Republic : but 
virtue cannot exist without courage, which is only the conscious- 
ness of independence. 

We are bound to recommend Republican Institutions to the 
acceptance of other nations. Can w^e do so, if we are content to 
be no wiser, no more virtuous, no more useful to Humanity, than 
those to whom such institutions are denied 1 Responsibility is 
always in proportion to the talent enjoyed. Neither man nor 
nation can be wise or really virtuous, or useful, when dependent 
on the caprice or even on the favor of another. Is there one 
among the tens of thousands of inventions in the Patent Office 
that was made by a slave, or even by one whose blood had been 
recently attainted by slavery ? Peter the Great, master of so 
many millions of slaves, resorted to the shop of a free mechanic 
of Saardam to learn the mystery of ship-building. His successor, 
Nicholas, employs Whistler, a Massachusetts engineer, to project 
his railroads ; Ross Winans, a Baltimore mechanic, to construct 
his locomotives ; and Orsamus Eaton, a carriage-maivcr of Troy, 
to construct his cars. Do you wonder that loving Freedom for 
such fruits, I also have set my face firmly against Slavery ? 

If we act hereafter as we have acted hitherto, we shall be con- 
tinually changing old things, old laws, old customs, aud even old 
Constitutions, for new ones. Does any one doubt this ? Have 
we not already a third Constitution in this State ? Has any one 
of the States a Constitution older than twenty -five years 1 But 
political progress, if not regulated v.ith moderation, may move 
too fast ; and if not wisely guided will lead to ruin. It is the 
people themselves, and not any power above or aside from them, 
that alone must regulate and direct that progress. Be they never 
so honest, they cannot discharge so great a political trust wisely, 
except they act on such generous impulses, and with such lofty 
purposes, as only bold and independent men can conceive. The 



10 THE TRUE BASIS OF 

people must be independent, or this Republic, like all Republics 
that have gone before it, must be ruled and ruined by dema- 
gogues. 

I am far from supposing that we are signally deficient in inde- 
pendence. I know that it is a national, a hereditary and a popu- 
lar sentiment ; that we annually celebrate, and always glory in 
our independence. We do so justly, for nowhere else does even 
a form or a shadow of popular independence exist ; while here it is 
the very rock on which our Institutions rest. Nevertheless, oc- 
casions for the exercise of this virtue may be neglected. 

We hold in contempt, equally just and profound, him who im- 
poses, and him who wears a menial livery ; and yet, I think, that 
we are accustomed to regard with no great severity, the employer 
who exacts, -or the mechanic, clerk or laborer, who yields political 
conformity in consideration of wages. We insist, as we ought, 
that every citizen in the State shall be qualified by education for 
citizenship ; but we are by no means unanimous that one citizen, 
or class of citizens, shall not prescribe its own creed, in the in 
struction of the children of others. We construct and remodel 
partizan formulas and platforms with changing circumstances, with 
almost as much diligence and versatility as the Mexicans ; and w^e 
attempt to enforce conformity to them, with scarcely less of zeal 
and intolerance, not indeed by the sword, but by the greater ter- 
ror of political proscription. We resist argument, not always 
with argument, but often with personal denunciation, and some- 
times even with combined violence. We differ, indeed, as to the par- 
ticular errors of political faith, that shall be corrected by this ex- 
treme remedy ; but, nevertheless, the number of those who alto- 
gether deny its necessity and suitableness in some cases, is very 
small. 

We justly maintain that a Free Press is the palladium of lib- 
erty ; and yet, mutually proscribing all editorial independence that 
is manifested by opposition to our own opinions, we have only at- 
tained a press that is free in the sense that every interest, party, 
faction, or sect, can have its own independent organ. If it be still 
maintained, notwithstanding these illustrations to the contrary, 
that entire social independence prevails, then, I ask, why is it so 
necessary to preserve with jealousy, as we justly do, the ballot, in 



AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE. 11 

lieu of open suffrage ; for if every citizen is really free from all 
fear and danger, why should he mask his vote more than his face. 
Believe me, fellow-citizens, independence always languishes in the 
very degree that intolerance prevails. We smile at the vanity of 
the factory girl at Lowell, who, having spent the secular part of 
the week in making calicos for the use of her unsophisticated 
countrywomen, disdainfully array's herself on Sundays exclusively 
in the tints of European dyes ; and yet, we are indifferent to the 
fact that beside a universal consumption of foreign silks, exclud- 
ing the silkworm from our country, we purchase, in England alone 
one hundred and fifty millions of yards of the same staiued mus- 
lins. We sustain, here and there, a rickety, or at Lest a contract- 
ed iron manufactory ; while we import iron to make railroads 
over our own endless ore fields, and we carry our prejudices 
against our struggling manufacturers and mechanics so far as to 
fastidiously avoid wearing on our persons, or using on our tables, 
or displaying in our drawing-rooms, any fabric, of whatsoever ma- 
terial, texture or color, that, in the course of its manufacture, has 
to our best knowledge and belief, ever come in contact with the 
honest hand of an American citizen. In all this, we are less inde- 
pendent than the Englishman, the Frenchman, or even the Si- 
berian. 

It is painful to confess the same infirmity in regard to hitellec- 
tual productions. We despise, deeply and universally, the spoiled 
child of pretension, who, going abroad for education or observa- 
tion, with a mind destitute of the philosophy of travel, returns to 
us with an affected tone and gait, sure indications of a craven 
spirit and a disloyal heart. And yet how intently do we not 
watch to see whether one of our countrymen obtains in Europe 
the honor of an aristocratic dinner, or of a presentation, in a gro- 
tesque costume, at Court ! How do we not suspend our judg- 
ment on the merits of the native artist, be he dancer, singer, act- 
or, limner, or sculptor, and even of the native author, inventor, 
orator, bishop, or statesman, until, by flattering those who habitu- 
ally depreciate his country, he passes safely the ordeal of foreign 
criticism, and so commends himself to our own most cautious ap- 
probation. How do we not consult foreign mirrors, for our very 
virtues and vices, not less than for our fashions, and think igno 



12 THE TRUE BASIS OF 

ranee, bribery, and Slavery, quite justified at home, if they can 
be matched against oppression, pauperism and crime in other 
countries ! 

On occasions too, we are bold in applauding heroic struggling 
for freedom abroad ; and we certainly have hailed with enthusi- 
asm every republican revolution in South America, in France, in 
Poland, in Germany, and in Hungary. And yet how does not our 
sympathy rise and fell, with every change of the political temper- 
ature in Europe? In just this extent, we are not only not in- 
dependent, but we are actually governed by the monarchies and 
aristocracies of the Old World. 

You may ask impatiently, if I require the American citizen to 
throw off all submission to law, all deference to authority, and 
all respect to the opinions of mankind, and that the American Re- 
public shall constantly wage an aggressive war against all foreign 
systems 1 I answer, no. There is here, as everywhere, a middle 
and a safe way. I would have the American citizen yield al- 
ways a cheerful acquiescence, and never a servile adherence, to 
the opinions of the majority of his countrymen and of mankind, 
whether they be engrossed in the forms of law or not, on all 
questions involving no moral principle ; and even in regard to 
such as do affect the conscience, I would have him avoid not 
only faction, but even the appearance of it. But I demand, at 
the same time, that he shall have his own matured and inde- 
pendent convictions, the result not of any authority, domestic 
or foreign, on every measure of public policy, and so, that 
while always temperate and courteous, he shall always be a free 
and outspeaking censor, upon not only opinions, customs and 
administration, but even upon laws and constitutions themselves. 
What I thus require of the citizen, I insist, also, that he shall 
allow to every one of his fellow-citizens. I would have the na- 
tion also, though moderate and pacific, yet always frank, de- 
cided and firm, in bearing its testimony against error and op- 
pression ; and while abstaining from forcible intervention in 
foreign disputes, yet always fearlessly rendering to the cause of 
Republicanism everywhere, by influence and example, all the aid 
that the laws of nations do not peremptorily, or, in their true spirit, 
forbid. 



AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE. 13 

Do I propose in this a heretical, or even a new standard of 
public or private duty ? All agree that the customary, and even 
the legal standards in other countries are too lo^Y. Must we then 
abide by them now and forever'? That would be to yield our in- 
dependence, and to be false towards mankind. Who will main- 
tain that the standard established at any one time by a ma- 
jority in our country is infallible, and therefore final 1 If it be 
so, why have we reserved, by our Constitution, freedom of Speech, 
of the Press, and of Suffrage, to reverse it 1 No, we may change 
everything, first complying, however, with constitutional condi- 
tions. Storms and commotions must indeed be avoided, but the 
political waters must nevertheless be agitated always, or they will 
stagnate. Let no one suppose that the human mind will consent 
to rest in error. It vibrates, however, only that it may settle at 
last in immutable truth and justice. Nor need we fear that wc 
shall be too bold. Conformity is always easier than contention ; 
and imitation is always easier than innovation. There are many 
who delight in ease, where there is one who chooses, and fearless- 
ly pursues, the path of heroic duty. 

Moreover, while we are expecting hopefully to see foreign cus- 
toms and institutions brought, by the influence of commerce, into 
conformity with our own, it is quite manifest that commerce has 
reciprocating influences, tending to demoralize ourselves, and so 
to assimilate our opinions, manners, and customs, ultimately to 
those of aristocracy and despotism. We cannot aflford to err at 
all on that side. We exist as a free people only by force of our 
very peculiarities. They are the legitimate peculiarities of Re- 
publicanism, and, as such, are the test of nationality. 

Nationality ! It is as just as it is popular. Whatever policy, 
interest or institution is local, sectional, or foreign, must be zeal- 
ously w^atched and counteracted ; for it tends directly to social 
derangement, and so to the subversion of our democratic consti- 
tution. 

But it is seen at once that this Nationality is identical with that 
very political independence which results from a high tone of in- 
dividuality on the part of the citizen. Let it have free play, then, 
and so let every citizen value himself at his just worth, in body 
and soul ; namely, not a serf or a subject of any human authori- 



14 THE TRUE BASIS OF 

ty, or the inferior of any class, however great or wise, but a free- 
man, who is so because " Truth has made him free ;" who not 
only, equally with all others, rules in the Republic, but is also 
bound, equally with any other, to exercise designing wisdom and 
executive vigor and efficiency in the eternal duty of saving and 
perfecting the State. When this Nationality shall prevail, we 
shall no more see fashion, wealth, social rank, political combina- 
tion, or even official proscription, effective in suppressing the ut- 
terance of mature opinions and true convictions ; and so enforc- 
ing for brief periods, with long reactions, political conformity, at 
the hazard of the public welfare, and at the cost of the public 
virtue. 

Let this Nationality prevail, and then, instead of keenly watch- 
ing, not without sinister wishes, for war or famine, the fitful skies, 
or the evermore capricious diplomacy of Europe ; and instead of 
being hurried into unwise commercial expansion by the rise of 
credit there, and then back again into exhausting convulsions and 
bankruptcy by its fall, we shall have a steady and a prosperous, 
because it will be an independent, internal commerce. 

Let this Nationality prevail, and then we shall cease to under- 
value our own farmers, mechanics, and manufacturers, and their 
productions ; our own science, and literature, and inventions ; our 
own orators and statesmen ; in short, our own infinite resources 
and all-competent skill, our own virtue, and our own peculiar 
and justly envied freedom. 

Then, I am sure that, instead of perpetually levying large and 
exhausting armJes, like Russia, and wdthout wasting wealth in 
emulating the naval power of England, and without practicing a 
servile conformity to the diplomacy of Courts, and without cap- 
tiously seeking frivolous occasions for making the world sensible 
of our importance, we shall, by the force of our own genius and 
virtue, and the dignity of freedom, take, with the free consent of 
mankind, the first place in the great family of Nations. 

Gentlemen of the Institute : From the earnestness with which 
the theory of Free Trade is perpetually urged in some quarters, 
one might suppose that it was thought that the cardinal interest 
of the country lay in mere exchanging of merchandise. On the 
contrary, of the three great wheels of national prosperity, Agri- 



AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE. 15 

culture is the main one, Manufacture second, and Trade is the last. 
The cardinal interest of this and every country is, and always 
must be, Production. It is not traffic, but labor alone, that con- 
verts the resources of the country into wealth. The world has 
yet to see any State become great by mere trade. It has seen 
many become so by the exercise of industry. 

Where there are diversified resources, and industry is applied 
to only a few staples, three great interests are neglected, viz. : 
natural resources, which are left unimproved ; labor, that is left 
unemployed ; and internal exchanges, which a diversity of in- 
dustry would render necessary. The foreign commerce, which is 
based on such a narrow system of production, obliges the nation 
to sell its staples at prices reduced by competition in foreign mar- 
kets ; and to buy fabrics at prices established by monopoly in 
the same markets. 

This false economy crowds the culture of the few staples with 
excessive industry ; thus rendering labor dependent at home, 
while it brings the whole nation, tributary to the monopolizing 
manufacturer abroad. When all, or any of the nations of Europe 
shall, as well as ourselves, be found successfully competing with 
England in manufactures, then, and not till then, will the free 
trade she recommends, be as wise for others, as she now insists. 
But, when that time shall come, I venture to predict that England 
will cease to inculcate that dogma. 

The importance of maintaining such a polic}^ as will result in a 
diversified application of industry, seems to rest on these impreg- 
nable grounds, viz : — 1st. That the use of indigenous materials 
does not diminish, but on the contrary, increases the public 
wealth. 2d. That society is constituted so, that individuals vol- 
untarily classify themselves in all, and not in a few, departments 
of industry, by reason of a distributive congeniality of tastes and 
adaptation of powers ; and that while labor so distributed is more 
profitable, the general contentment and independence of the peo- 
ple is secured and j^reserved, and their enterprise is stimulated 
and sustained. 

I think it must be confessed now, by all candid observers within 
our country, that manufactures have become in a degree the ex- 
clusive employment of the citizens of the Eastern States ; and 



16 THE TRUE BASIS OF 

yet they are precarious, and comparatively unprofitable, because 
our own patronage, so generously discriminating in favor of 
European manufactures, enables them to make the desired fabrics 
sometimes at less cost : that the citizens of the Middle and 
Western States, are confined chiefly to the raising of staple 
breadstuffs, for which, while they have a great excess above the 
home consumption, resulting from the neglect of domestic manu- 
factures, they find a market almost overstocked with similar pro- 
ductions, raised in countries as peculiarly agricultural as our own ; 
and that the citizens of the Southern States, restrict themselves 
chiefly to the culture of cotton, of which, practically, they have 
the monopoly ; that the annual enlargement of the cotton culture 
tends to depress its price, and that they pay more dearly for the 
fabrics which they use, than would be necessary if our own manu- 
factures could better maintain a competition with those of 
Europe. 

These inconveniences would indeed become intolerable evils, if 
they were not compensated in some measure by the great increase 
of wealth resulting from the immigration of foreign labor ; and 
for the establishment of a new and prosperous gold trade be- 
tween the Atlantic States and California. 

Why should those inconveniences be endured 1 Certainly not 
because we do not know that they are unnecessary. We jealously 
guard our culture of breadstuffs and sugar against the competi- 
tion of the foreign farmer and planter in our own markets. 
Practically, our gold mining is equally |)rotected. We also give 
an exclusive preference in our internal commerce to our own 
shipping. No one questions the advantage of these great depart- 
ments of production. But it is not easy to see how the equally 
successful opening of other domestic resources should not be 
equally beneficial. 

Why should it be less profitable to supply ourselves with cop- 
per, iron, glass and paper from our own resources, and by our 
own industry, than it is to supply ourselves in the same way with 
flour, sugar and gold 1 Why should it not be as economical to 
manufacture our own cotton, wool, iron and gold, as it is to man- 
ufacture our own furniture, wooden clocks and ships? If mining 
and manufactures generally were not profitable in England, they 



AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE. 17 

would not be prosecuted there. If they are profitable there, they 
would be profitable here. You reply that manuflicturing labor 
is cheaper there. Yes, because you leave it there. If you offer 
inducements, it will come here just as freely as agricultural labor 
now comes. The ocean is reduced to a ferry. If you must de- 
pend on foreign skill for fabrics, I pray you bring that skill here, 
where you can sustain it with greater economy. 

The advocates of dependence on foreign manufactures, tell us 
that it is as well to sell gold and buy iron, as it would be to sell 
iron to buy gold. I reply, 1st. That, to the extent of our neces- 
sary consumption, having exhaustless resources and adequate in- 
dustry or ability to procure it, we ought to buy neither. 2d. 
When Boulton, the associate of the great Watt, showed his iron 
manuflictory, he said, " I sell here what all men are anxious to 
buy, Power." It has been proved that a nation may sell gold for 
iron without gaining power, as many a nation has bought iron 
without securing it. But it is clear, that the nation that makes 
its own iron creates its own power. 

It seems to be understood by the advocates of foreign manu- 
flictures here, that only those branches langijjsh which have not 
sufficient vigor to be brought to maturity, by never so much pro- 
tection. This is opposed to the experience of all mankind. There 
is not in France or in England, a successful culture or manufac- 
ture that has not been made so by the application of national 
protection and patronage. The manuflicturers of England are 
sustained, even now, by the sacrifice of agricultural labor there. 
The decline of agriculture is proved by a rapidly increasing emi- 
gration from the British Islands. What England calls free trade, 
is indeed a new form of protection, but it is protection, neverthe- 
less. She finds it equally effective and expensive. British com 
merce and British manuflictures do indeed flourish, but British 
empire declines. The decline is seen in the tameness of England 
now towards Eussia, France, and our own country, compared 
with the different attitude she maintained against all oflending 
powers in the age of the elder Pitt and the younger Pitt. 

It is insisted, however, that encouragement yielded to the in- 
dustry of one class of citizens, is partial and injurious to that of 
others. This cannot be in any just sense true, since the prosperity 



18 THE TRUE BASIS OF 

and vigor of each class depends in a great degree on the pros- 
perity and vigor of all the industrial classes. But all experience 
shows, that if Government do not favor domestic enterprise, its 
negative policy will benefit some foreign monopoly, which of all 
class-legislation is most injurious and least excusable. 

Once more, it is said that the present system must be right, 
because predictions of diasters, that should result from it, have 
been falsified. I do not dwell on the signs, which seem now to 
portend a fearful fulfillment, nevertheless, of those predictions. 
Let it suffice to sa}', that it is as common an error, to look prema- 
turely for the blights which must follow erroneous culture, as it 
IS to expect propitious fruits from that which is judicious. This 
nation is youthful and vigorous. It cannot now suffer long and 
deeply from any cause, for it has great recuperative energies. It 
is not destined to an immediate fall, or even to early decline. It 
is the part of wisdom, nevertheless, not to try how much of er- 
roneous administration it can bear, but to adapt our policy al- 
ways so as to favor the most complete and lasting success of the 
Republic. 

Gentlemen of the Institute : I refrain from discussing the de- 
tails of policy. Circumstances are hastening a necessity for an 
examination of them, in another place, where action follows de- 
bate, and is effective. I shall not be absent nor idle there. But 
I will not attempt to delude either myself or you into the belief 
that the opinions I have expressed, which, I trust, in some degree 
correspond with your own, will soon become fully engrafted into 
the policy of the Government. I shall perform my duty better 
by showing you that it is not wise to expect, nor even absolutely 
necessary to depend on, the exercise of a just patronage of our 
industry by the Government. 

This Republic, although constituting one nation, partakes of 
the form of a confederation of many States, and for the purpose 
of securing acquiescence, allows great power to minorities. Ai- 
though there is no real antagonism of interests, there is, never- 
theless, a wide divergence of opinion concerning those interests, 
resulting from the different degrees of maturity and development 
reached in the several States. Massachusetts and Virginia, New 
York and South Carolina, scarcely differ in their ages ; but, never- 



AMERICAN INDEPENDENCE. 19 

theless, they differ in their industrial system as widely as Penn- 
sylvania and Arkansas. The old free States have passed through 
the stages at which the merely agricultural and planting States - 
have only arrived. It would practically be as impossible to bring 
these latter States immediately up to our proper policy, as it 
would be to carry us backward to the system which they are pur- 
suing. They will resist all such efforts earnestly and persever- 
ingly, so long as they shall feel that they are unable, like us, to 
distribute their industry, and so to share in the benefits of that 
policy. All that we can expect, under such circumstances, from 
the Government, is some occasional and partial modification of its v 
financial policy, so as to favor the success of the efforts of the 
friends of home industry in establishing it on a safe basis, with- 
out the immediate and direct aid of Congress. And this will be 
sufficient. It is not yet forty years since New York applied 
in vahi to the United States to construct the Erie Canal, which 
was acknowledged to be the incipient measure in a system of In- 
ternal Improvements to be co-extensive with the Republic. Now, 
not only that canal has been built, but the whole system is in a 
train of accomplishment, although Congress has not only never 
adopted, but has almost constantly repudiated it. Private and 
corporate enterprise, sustained by the States, has worked out 
what the Federal Government has refused to undertake. The 
same agencies will establish the American system. Capital, la- 
bor, science, skill, are augmenting here. Power is daily becom- 
ing cheaper, and consumption more extensive. New Hampshire, 
Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Vermont, New York, 
Pennsylvania, New^ Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, and Ohio, have 
become manufiicturing States. The advantages resulting from 
the policy are indicated, not more by the universal improvement 
of the agricultural districts in these States, than by the prosperity 
and growth of their towns and cities. Hero are Boston, Lowell, 
Lawrence, Springfield, Providence, New Haven, Rutland, Ben- 
nington, New York, Albany, Troy, Rochester, and Buffiilo, Phila- 
delphia and Pittsburgh, Newark and Patterson, AVilmington and 
Baltimore, Cinciimati and Cleveland ; contrast with them the 
towns and cities of those States which practically adhere to the 
policy of employing foreign industry, and you see plainly the 



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PROSPECTUS 



HYDROPATHIC QUARTERLY REVIEW, 

A PROFESSIONAL MAGAZINE, 

Devoted to Medical Reform, embracing Articles by The Best Writers on 
Anatomy, Physiology, Pathology, Surgery, Therapeutics, Midwifery, 
etc. ; Reports of Remarkable Cases in General Practice, Criticisms on 
the Theory ^.nd Practice of the various Opposing Systems of Medical 
Science, Reviews of New Publications of all Schooi^ op Medicine, Re- 
ports op the Progress of Heaj.th Reform in ajx its aspects, etc., etc., 
WITH Approprlate Engraved Illustrations. 



At the solicitation of many of the leading practitioners and prominent friends 
of Water-Cure, the subscriliers have commenced the publication of a Xew Illustrated Quar- 
terly Magazine, with the above Title. It is more strictly Scientific and Professional than the 
Water-Cure Journal, and more especially the mediimi through which the Professors and Physi- 
cians of the Hydropathic school can communicate to each other and the public their views in 
reltition to all departments of the Healing Art, and the resulis of their investigations on all sub- 
jects pertaining to Health-Reform and Medical Improvement. Its matter will be arranged under 
the following general heads : 

I. Essays. 
The most learned and experienced writers in America and Europe will furnish 

articles oa Anatomy, Physiology, Pathology, Surgery, Therapeutics, Midwifery, the Laws of 
Health, Philosophy of Water-Cure, etc., which will be Amixy Illusi-rated by the Most Accurate 

ASV BKAUTIFULLY KXECLTED E-\URAVINGS yfE CAN PKOCLRE. 

II. Reports. 
Remarkable cases in Surgery, Obstetrics, and in General Practice, treated on 

Hydropathic principles, will be reported in detail, by the most eminent and scientific practitioners 
and teachers of our system. An interesting and instructive feature, also, will be the Reports of 
the most important cases presented at the Clinique of the new school of the Hydropathic and 
Hygienic Institute, now in operation at 15 Laight street, New York city. 

III. Criticisms. ^ 

In this department, the cases treated by physicTans of those systems we oppose 

will be noticed fairly, and commented on with uniimited freedom. Their errors in theory wUl 
be exposed ; their fallacies in practice explained ; and the better way indicated by a contrast 
of results with those of Hydropathic practice. 

IV. Reviews. 

New Publications, whether books or periodicals, of all actual schools or pre- 
tended systems of medicine— Allopathic, Homeopathic, Eclectic, Mesmeric, Botanic, etc., will be 
closely but candidly exaihiiu d, and severely l)Ut impartially criticised. The good or bad— the 
truth or falsity— of all their teachm-s, will be plainly pointed out without regard to fear or favor. 

V. Records. 

Here will be noted the triumphs of our system, and the progress of Health- 
Reform in its Medical, Social, Hygienic and Dietetic aspects. Our readers will be kept posted up 
on all these topics, compiled from authentic sources of information in this country and Europe. 

Each number will contain from 190 to 200 or more pages '; and each Volume will make an 
invaluable addition to the Library of every person interested in Medical and Health Reform. 

TEEMS IN ADVANC^E. 

Single Copy One Year, . . . Two Dollars. | FnTS Copies One, Year, . . Eight Dollars. 
Ten Copies One Year, . . . Fifteen Dollars. 
The new Volume commenced October, 1853. Subscriptions may be sent in at once. 

Please address, post-paid, FOWLERS AND WELLS, 

CuNTON Hall, 131 Nassau St., New York. 
jg®- Agents supplied with Sample Numbers for Canvassing, at the lowest Club rates. 



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